


Everlasting

by sunflowerbright



Category: Lost
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, complete wish-fullfillment, season 2 what season 2??, spoilers for season 2 i guess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-12
Updated: 2013-04-12
Packaged: 2017-12-08 07:02:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/758456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunflowerbright/pseuds/sunflowerbright
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Things go a little differently for Shannon on the island. This is the aftermath.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Everlasting

 

_”You think this is easy for me?” She’d yelled at him._

_”Maybe someone would actually care about your problems if you weren’t such a horrid bitch!”_

They hadn’t always fought a lot. Of course, they had been like other siblings, too close in age to not push each other’s buttons as much as they could, to pull and yank at hair, to hiss and scream and taunt.

But it wasn’t actually that often that they had actual, verbal conflicts that would escalate into acutely hurtful territory, saying words that left deep wounds, bleeding and raw and never completely closed, because they were both too proud and too stubborn to ever apologize for them.

It had been both better and worse on the island. Better because they needed each other here, more than they had before. Better because they were family and they were alone here, and even if she screwed up enough to make him want to leave, he couldn’t.

Worse, exactly because of that. Boone had never let her down before and she didn’t think he was going to start now. Not really talking to her for several days in a row was just him figuring things out, just him needing some space on top of all the craziness that was this place.

Shannon couldn’t actually remember the last thing she had said to him before he died.

And that is all she is thinking about as the bullet hit home and everything turned black.

She doesn’t hear Sayid’s anguished yells, doesn’t see Michael’s and Jin’s horrified, surprised faces. Shannon had no idea what had happened to her until she woke up on a cot, Sawyer snoring heavily as he slept in the bunk over her: she knew it was Sawyer because she had heard that particular snore several times before, on the beach, usually when the man was too exhausted to even really go asleep, but had merely collapsed in his make-shift home.

There was an arm thrown over the edge of the bunk-bed. It was slim and feminine and definitely not Sawyer’s. It looked like Kate’s and Shannon wanted to smile, just a little bit.

But she only kept her focus on them for a moment, because then there was a gentle pressure on her arm and she turned her head, wanting to see where it came from.

“You’re awake,” Sayid said, his voice breathless with relief. Shannon smiled

 

*

 

She was pretty sure that he started avoiding her after that. Not outright: he hovered at her bedside almost all the time, helped get food and water into her, held her hand when she awoke from terrors through the night, nightmares she couldn’t escape. It was not often that he wasn’t there, replaced only a few times by Jack or Sun or Kate, even Claire and Aaron at one point, the baby’s chubby fingers enclosing tightly around a lock of her hair, pulling in fascination.

Sayid was nearly always there to hover and worry, but Shannon had noticed that he didn’t really talk to her anymore. When she was healed enough to be so, she got angry and the silence that stretched between them after that felt tense and awkward.

Well, they seemed tense and awkward to her anyway: Sayid, as always, seemed unaffected. Shannon always wondered how he could keep his cool through everything.

Then she remembered _war_ and _torture_ and how he handled a gun and the cold, dead look that would sometimes appear in his eyes whenever he thought of _that_ , and maybe she understood it a little. How he kept calm in the face of their situation.

It was not until Sawyer, of all people, pointed it out to her, that she realized his avoidance was possibly Sayid just… cracking under pressure.

“For god’s sake, the man feels guilty,” the red-neck grumbled, rolling his shoulder carefully – his bullet wound had healed as well as hers, and faster too, but it was still sore, his arm weak.

Shannon frowned. “Guilty? What does he have to feel guilty about?” Sayid was not the one to pull the trigger, or even drag her out there: she was the one going on a mad chase through the jungle. In horrible weather too.

“The hell do I know?” Was all the reply she got. Shannon had to fight hard not to roll her eyes.

Okay, she rolled her eyes at him. Just a bit. Not being condescending towards Sawyer was really hard, especially when they had been ‘bunk-mates’ as he had so charmingly called it for the past many weeks.

Technically she was supposed to stay in the bunker, bed-rest still on the menu, but of all things, it was sleeping outside, under the stars, that she missed.

Dragging blankets and a pillow from the bunker outside on the beach was not the worst idea. Only telling Sawyer just showed the genius of her plan: he wouldn’t tell her not to do it, wouldn’t go tattling to Jack and should something happen, someone would know where she had gone.

She did not want to admit that it was also a bit her trying to avoid Sayid: avoid the awkwardness, avoid the tense set of his shoulders, the hard glint in his eyes. She needed just a bit of fresh air, and a night to herself, just to get her thoughts together. And then she’d make the man use his words. Then they’d talk.

She didn’t want to admit that a part of her was just scared, of rejection, of more pain.

As usual, her plan did not go as she wanted it to.

She was hovering on the edge of sleep, eyes half-open and looking at the stars when a warm hand suddenly moved up her arm, over her shoulders, cradling her jaw gently. To be honest, she would have screamed out loud if it wasn’t for the fact that she knew that touch all too well. And despite a part of her wanting to tell him to leave her alone (or to go to hell), she let Sayid slip in beside her, knowing she would want him back as soon as he had left.

“You cannot just disappear like that,” he said, and the sound of his voice was like warm honey after so long. His arms wound around her, his lips pressing against her cheek and she couldn’t stop a small sigh from escaping. The breeze from the sea was slightly chilly, but he was hot as a furnace beside her.

“I told Sawyer where I was,” she drowsily murmured, feeling sleepy again as his hands soothingly roamed up and down her sides, his beards still tickling her face. “It’s just the beach. Charlie and Claire are sleeping right over there. I was in no danger.”

Clearly the wrong thing to say. His arms tightened around her suddenly, hard enough to make her wake up a bit more as he pulled her closer. It felt as if he was trying to press as much of his body against hers as possible, cover her until no-one else could get to her.

_Oh._

“I’m alright,” she mumbled, startling as she felt something wet and cold against her shoulder where he had buried his face. He was crying, his shoulders trembling lightly. He wasn’t making a sound.

“It’s okay,” she repeated. “I’m not…”

_I’m not dead like Boone. I’m not gone._

No, she was still stuck on this godforsaken island, with little to no chance of escape, with monsters and ‘others’ trying to get to them. With even their allies almost killing them.

Sayid pressed himself impossibly closer to her, and Shannon reached up to grasp hold of his hair, cling to his shirt, anything, even though she knew he would stay even if she let go.

“We’ll be okay,” she whispered, and meant it.


End file.
